Silent film theater reopens with Chaplin classic 'Modern Times'

Published: Friday, November 05, 1999

LOS ANGELES {AP} The silent-film era flickers to life again today with the reopening of the nation's only cinema devoted to Buster Keaton, Douglas Fairbanks and other legends of Hollywood's not-so-modern times.

Refurbished and updated with such amenities as a cappuccino bar, the Silent Movie Theatre begins its new run with Charlie Chaplin's "Modern Times," the last great silent film.

The rebirth of the moviehouse comes nearly three years after the public slaying of former proprietor Laurence Austin. The theater has been closed since Austin was gunned down in the lobby while movie-goers were watching a film in 1997.

For a time, it looked as though the theater would remain closed because of legal wrangling over ownership and interest by potential buyers who wanted the site for other purposes.

Charlie Lustman put together an investment group that bought the theater for $650,000 last spring to revive it as a silent movie house.

He spent four months painting and redecorating the 224-seat theater, converting an upstairs apartment into a coffee bar and gallery for movie art and adding memorabilia from silent days.

"These are the pioneers of film. These are the people who built Los Angeles," Lustman said, gesturing at pictures of Mary Pickford, Harold Lloyd and other silent stars that line the theater walls. "This is a shrine for these artists."

The theater was opened by John Hampton in 1942, 15 years after talkies entered the picture. Hampton and his wife, Dorothy, closed it in 1979.

It reopened in 1991 after Austin persuaded Mrs. Hampton, now a widow, to let him take over. Austin also coaxed Mrs. Hampton to sign the business over to him for free.

In 1997, a 19-year-old gunman shot the 74-year-old Austin in the face at the theater's candy counter, wounded a clerk and fled.

When the gunman was caught weeks later, police learned that James Van Sickle, who was running the projector when the murder happened, had paid to have Austin killed. Van Sickle was Austin's live-in lover and beneficiary of his $1 million estate.

"Modern Times" is running Friday and Saturday nights for invitation-only audiences and for the public Sunday afternoon and evening. Starting next week, the theater will run silent movies Wednesdays through Sundays, with old talking pictures such as the Marx Brothers' "Duck Soup" running on Tuesdays.